Africa-Development: Poverty Tightens its Stranglehold

By Gumisai Mutume, InterPress Service 11 June 1997

CAPE TOWN, Jun 11 (IPS) -- Poverty remains one of the losing
battles being fought on the African continent, the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP) says.

In its 1997 Human Development Report, launched here Thursday,
the UNDP says Sub-Saharan Africa together with South Asia are the
two regions hardest hit by poverty.

"Sub-Saharan Africa has the highest proportion of people in --
and the fastest growth in -- human poverty," says the report.
"Some 220 million people in the region are income-poor ... and it
is estimated that by 2000, half the people in Sub-Saharan Africa
will be in income poverty."

This year's report focuses on poverty -- income poverty and
poverty from a human development perspective, that is
opportunities for living a tolerable life.

Across the world poverty has been reduced in the past 50 years
more than it has fallen in the previous 500, the report says. But
the progress has been marked by ups and downs, some regions often
lagging behind others.

"This is the only continent in the world that will become
poorer in the 21st century than it was in the 20th century," says
Djibril Diallo, UNDP's Director of Public Affairs.

All of the countries, except one, ranked at the bottom of the
new Human Poverty Index (HPI) introduced in this year's report are
in Africa: Niger, Sierra Leone, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Mali,
Cambodia and Mozambique. Human poverty exceeds 50 percent of the
population in these countries.

"The cause for greatest concern for Sub-Saharan Africa is that
poverty is increasing," the report warns. The least developed
countries in the region face the biggest challenges and require
special international support.

"The situation is not monolithic," says Renosi Mokate of the
Centre for Reconstruction and Development at South Africa's
University of Pretoria. "One major contributory factor is
political instability. We tend to see a general correlation
between levels of poverty and lack of stability."

Conflict prevention and resolution, debt relief, more and
better directed aid, opening up of global markets especially for
the continent's agricultural produce could all help assist in
tackling poverty.

Mokate, a development specialist, says talk of macro-economic
stability tends to be interpreted as keeping government budget
deficits low.

World Bank and International Monetary Fund-led structural
adjustment programmes, currently in full swing across the
continent, also preach government austerity.

"Yet human resource capacities require more government
spending in areas such as education and health. This is often the
dilemma many countries face," she told IPS.

Another millstone around the necks of Sub-Saharan African
countries is an ever increasing debt burden. The debt of the
world's 41 poorest countries, most of them in Africa, has risen to
215 billion dollars from 183 billion in 1990 and 55 billion in
1980.

"However, there are islands of hope which could be the basis
for recovery," Diallo says. "For instance there is an increase
in the number of countries turning to good governance and
democracy."

This year's report is the eighth in a series of annual reports
compiled by UNDP's Human Development Team led by Richard Jolly in
collaboration with a group of scholars.

"Just when the possibilities for advance should be greater
than ever, new global pressures are creating or threatening
further increases in poverty," the authors say.

Slow economic growth and stagnation has hit 100 countries, and
conflict continues in 30 countries, most of which are in
Africa.

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